Representing foreign workers in the private security industry: a South African perspective on trade union engagement

2014 ◽  
Vol 52 (1) ◽  
pp. 123-149
Author(s):  
Steven Gordon ◽  
Brij Maharaj
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
South African ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Private Security ◽  
Foreign Workers ◽  
Undocumented Migrant ◽  
Trade Union Movement ◽  
Study Approach

ABSTRACTIn recent years South African cities have become home to a large number of undocumented migrant workers. If trade unions do not organise undocumented migrant workers, it opens up such workers to exploitation and maltreatment by employers, thereby creating a split labour market that undermines the entire labour movement. This article focuses on the responses of the national trade union movement in the private security sector to the presence of undocumented workers at the grassroots level. Using a case study approach, we find that the pressures of labour market informalisation in the industry prompt unions to seek to maintain and advance their position from their traditional support base of citizen workers rather than attempt to include new groups. The failure to engage is reinforced by anti-immigrant attitudes which link foreigners with problems in the industry such as low wages and portrays such workers as co-conspirators rather than comrades. While justice and solidarity have always been the foundation of trade unionism in South Africa, the movement is in danger of failing this test if the current situation in terms of the exclusion of undocumented foreign workers persists.

scholarly journals Some Useful Sources

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 693-698
Author(s):  
Don Flynn
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
List Type ◽  
Type Number ◽  
Undocumented Migrant ◽  
Community Based ◽  
Migrant Community ◽  
Forced Labour

Networks and projects around the theme of migrants in the labour market can be discussed under the following headings: 1.Trade union-based initiatives2.Migrant community-based initiatives3.Issues of acknowledged concern that generate national responses (forced labour, trafficked workers, undocumented migrant workers, etc.).

Unions and Migrant Workers

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sonila Danaj ◽  
Erka Çaro ◽  
Laura Mankki ◽  
Markku Sippola ◽  
Nathan Lillie
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Market Regulation ◽  
Host Countries ◽  
Informal Work ◽  
Work Relations ◽  
Labour Market Regulation ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter examines the relationship between migrant workers and trade unions in different host countries. Based on a series of biographic interviews with Estonian migrant workers in Finland and Albanian workers in Italy and Greece, it makes the case that when migrants join unions, it is usually a result of an individual movement out of precarious and sometimes informal work into secure, formal work relations. The availability of such secure jobs for migrants is a result of inclusive national institutions of labour market regulation, and a strong trade union workplace presence. Although in all three countries the migrants were quite passive and instrumentalist in their relations to unions, they nonetheless generally joined when working in unionized contexts, as a way of conforming to workplace norms.

Trade Unions and the Welfare of Rural-Urban Migrant Workers in China

ILR Review ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 001979392110044
Author(s):  
Alison Booth ◽  
Richard Freeman ◽  
Xin Meng ◽  
Jilu Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
Mental Health Problems ◽  
Panel Survey ◽  
Monthly Income ◽  
Work Related ◽  
Urban Migrant

Using a panel survey, the authors investigate how the welfare of rural-urban migrant workers in China is affected by trade union presence at the workplace. Controlling for individual fixed effects, they find the following. Relative to workers from workplaces without union presence or with inactive unions, both union-covered non-members and union members in workplaces with active unions earn higher monthly income, are more likely to have a written contract, be covered by social insurances, receive fringe benefits, express work-related grievances through official channels, feel more satisfied with their lives, and are less likely to have mental health problems.

scholarly journals MODEL PERLINDUNGAN HUKUM INTEGRATIF BURUH MIGRAN INDONESIA DALAM MASYARAKAT EKONOMI ASEAN

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdul Rasyid Saliman ◽  
E. Vita Mutiarawati
Keyword(s):  
Trade Union ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Industrial Relation ◽  
Migrant Worker ◽  
Legal Protection ◽  
Foreign Workers ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
Cooperation Agreement ◽  
Labor Contract ◽  
The Government

The effort of providing protection for all Indonesian migrant workers abroad is focused on two categories. Firstly, the phase of pre-departure of Indonesian migrant workers in which an approach of cross sectors is carried out by both the Indonesian government and the private agencies in order to prepare them with all the things needed when they arrive at countries of their destination. Secondly is the phase of arrival and post-arrival of Indonesian migrant workers abroad. As in Malaysia, the policy on the arragenment of labor affairs either for Malaysian workers or for foreign workers is officially and legally protected in Labor Act of 1955, Industrial Relation Act of 1967, Trade Union Act of 1959, and in Compensation Act of 1952. The process of labor trials is settled through The Labor Court. This Labor Court no more handles the process of trial of illegally foreign workers. There are needs of establishing Labor Cooperation Agreement (LCA) on the ministerail level, Implementaion Agreement serving as the general policy on the executors level as well as Standardized Labor Contract which has been amended. The establishments of Labor Cooperation Agreement, Implementing Agreement and Standardized Labor Contract should occur before all workers leave Indonesia and are aimed at providing legal protection for every single Indonesian migrant worker. In order that there is no collision between the Malaysian laws and Indonesian laws, the government officials of related issues of both countries must do observations and conduct discussions without neglecting the prevail laws of each country. Any issue of labor affairs should always be referred to the laws of both countries.

Globalisation and the dilemmas of international trade unionism

2000 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 29-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Gumbrell-McCormick
Keyword(s):  
International Trade ◽  
Multinational Corporations ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Global Economy ◽  
Trade Union Movement ◽  
Labour Movement ◽  
Trade Unionism ◽  
Union Movement ◽  
Economic Developments

This article presents the author's reflections on the possibilities of a restructuring of the international trade union movement, on the basis of a collective research project to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions (ICFTU) which seeks to open a debate within the movement over the lessons to be learned from its history as a guide for its future action. The most important question facing the trade union movement today is what is generally called 'globalisation', a phenomenon that goes back many years, both in terms of economic developments and labour struggles. From this perspective, the paper examines the basis for the existing divisions of the international labour movement, before going over the work of the ICFTU and of the International Trade Secretariats (ITSs) to achieve the regulation of the multinational corporations and of the international economy, and concluding on the prospects for unity of action in the unions' work around the global economy.

Silence and the Image of Helplessness: The Challenge of Tozen Union

2019 ◽  
pp. 53-78
Author(s):  
Reiko Shindo
Keyword(s):  
Trade Union ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Linguistic Diversity ◽  
Foreign Workers ◽  
National Union ◽  
English Speaking

This chapter focuses on the Nambu Foreign Workers Caucus (FWC), the migrant workers' branch of the trade union, National Union of General Workers Tokyo Nambu (hereafter referred to as Nambu), and largely led by English-speaking migrants. It traces the events where the FWC split from Nambu, a trade union largely composed of Japanese-speaking members, to form a new union called Tozen. At the heart of the split was the question of silence. Many Nambu FWC members were troubled not only because they had been silenced by Japanese union members for their inability to speak Japanese, but also because their silence was linked to a sign of powerlessness. They were regarded as helpless victims, unable to act and speak on their own. By looking at Tozen's activities, the chapter also investigates how the union, driven by the need to make noncitizens audible, handles linguistic diversity among its members.

British Trade Unions and European Union Integration in the 1990s: Politics versus Political Economy

2002 ◽  
Vol 50 (2) ◽  
pp. 332-353 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerard Strange
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Political Economy ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Economic And Monetary Union ◽  
Trade Union Movement ◽  
Trade Unionism ◽  
Union Movement ◽  
British Trade ◽  
Careful Assessment

This article evaluates the changing assessments within the British trade union movement of the efficacy of European Union integration from the viewpoint of labour interests. It argues that there has been a marked further ‘Europeanisation’ of British trade unionism during the 1990s, consolidating an on-going process which previous research shows began in earnest in the mid 1980s. A shift in trade union economic policy assessments has seen the decisive abandonment of the previously dominant ‘naive’ or national Keynesianism. While there remain important differences in economic perspective between unions, these are not such as would create significant divisions over the question of European integration per se, the net benefits of which are now generally, though perhaps not universally, accepted. The absence of fundamental divisions is evident from a careful assessment of the debates about economic and monetary union at TUC Congress. The Europeanisation of British trade unionism needs to be seen within the context of an emergent regionalism, in Europe and elsewhere. It can best be understood as a rational response by an important corporate actor (albeit one whose national influence has been considerably diminished in recent decades) to globalisation and a significantly changing political economy environment.

Cross-border labour markets and the role of trade unions in representing migrant workers’ interests

2020 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-255
Author(s):  
Adrien Thomas
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Migrant Workers ◽  
Trade Unions ◽  
Organizational Structures ◽  
Labour Markets ◽  
Labour Migration ◽  
Organizational Dynamics ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Survey Results

New patterns of labour migration are reshaping labour markets and raising new challenges for labour market actors, especially trade unions. This article critically discusses unionization strategies targeting migrant workers and the political and organizational dilemmas involved, taking as an example the case of Luxembourg, a founding member of the European Union with a highly internationalized labour market. Relying on qualitative research and survey results, this article sets out the strategies adopted by trade unions to unionize migrant workers, before discussing the dilemmas and tensions related to the diversification of trade union policies and organizational structures in response to labour migration. It provides valuable insights into two broader issues: the socio-political and organizational dynamics involved in trade unions’ inclusion of migrant workers and the potential role of trade unions in building transnational links and cohesion in border regions.

The Relationship between Working Life and Individualisation: A Study among Danish Trade Union Members

1997 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 197-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Morten Madsen
Keyword(s):  
Labour Market ◽  
Trade Union ◽  
Current Trend ◽  
Modern Society ◽  
Working Life ◽  
Job Characteristics ◽  
Value Orientations ◽  
Trade Union Movement ◽  
Union Movement ◽  
Wage Earners

A significant current trend in the industrialised countries is a growing individualization among wages-earners: i.e changes from collective value orientations based on solidarity and equality towards more individualistic value orientations based on self-interest and personal opportunities. This paper analyses relations between these changes in wage-earners' identity, labour market position, job characteristics, and relationship to the company and trade union: both empirically, by using Danish survey data from the research project: `The Employee Perspective on Working Life and Politics', and theoretically, by discussing the contrasting ideas of Hirsch and Roth (1986) and Valkenburg (1995) and Zoll (1995). The analysis shows both expected and surprising relationships between labour market positions, job characteristics and individualization. Furthermore, the paper demonstrates that the term individualization' must be understood as a relative concept, and that an increased individualization does not necessarily lead towards a dissolution of the trade union movement as a representative of wage-earners' interests in modern society.

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